


consumed

by marzipan (orphan_account)



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, M/M, Pre-Series, Professor Moriarty - Freeform, intense is an understatement when it comes to their relationship tendencies, they're both kind of still. young and. coming into their own
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-21
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-08-05 11:25:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16366988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/marzipan
Summary: au where jim and mycroft met before "Moriarty," and they both fall hard and fast into something they're not quite prepared but somehow incredibly suited for





	1. Chapter 1

 

Jim looks up at him, slow blinking with those dark, dark lashes. He breathes out through his nose. Breathing - right. A good thing to do. Mycroft takes a shuddery breath himself. He feels as if his blood’s turned to molten metal.

 

Jim brings something strange over him; whatever it is, every time he so much as lays eyes on him, it sears through his veins.

 

His cock, lying heavy on Jim’s tongue, is hot, swollen. Jim laps at it. Mycroft’s fingers scrape back along Jim’s scalp. Jim moves, taking him deeper, and he’s merciless about it. 

 

Mycroft bites back a growl and throws his head back as Jim swallows around him, remembering he’s still in his office, with Jim on his knees before him. 

 

Jim pulls off and stands, mouth red, drool on his chin - Mycroft stares uncomprehendingly. Before he’s capable of formulating a question, Jim straddles him, mouth hot on his, grabbing at his hands and guiding them lower.

 

Not to his cock, Mycroft realizes. He vaguely registers Jim undoing his trousers, the pushing of fabric, and, oh. He’s wearing a plug, under that nice suit of his he’d put on to come visit Mycroft in his office, and now Mycroft’s got him flat on his back on that big desk of his. 

 

Ink from a bottle drips, seeping into the carpet beneath the desk. 

 

He stares down at this impossible creature.

 

A moment too long, perhaps. Jim’s adoring look turns to slight apprehension.

 

“You haven’t changed your mind about me, have you?” he asks, so softly Mycroft feels the words more than he hears them.

 

Mycroft kisses him; slow, deliberate this time. 

 

“How could you say that?” he murmurs. “How could you possibly even entertain that thought? We’re far, far past the point.”

  
  
  


. . 

  
  
  


Jim hadn’t thought much of Mycroft Holmes the first time they met. He hadn’t thought Mycroft thought much of him - no,  _ about _ him - either.

  
  


The man, clearly a government worker, comes into his university office asking him to look over some numbers. And Jim laughs at him.

 

“I’m perfectly serious,” he’d says, unbothered. “I’d tell you I’d make it worth your while but I’ve a feeling monetary gain is wholly uninteresting to you. Let’s put it this way, you would be doing me a favor.”

 

The implication being one would be returned, of course. It isn’t the offer itself so much as the fact that Mycroft Holmes thought he had anything he could give Jim that catches Jim’s attention. He reaches for the file.

 

Mycroft pulls it back. 

 

“I’ll need you to sign some non-disclosure agreements first. Standard procedure, I’m sure you understand.”

 

Jim gives him a bewildered look.

 

“It’s certainly not standard procedure to have a third party look over government budgets. There are firms for that,” he snaps, reaching again for the file, which he was handed this time. 

 

Then it’s hours later before Jim looks up, startled not with the passage of time - he’d yet to realize it - but the work he’d been checked.

 

“These are missile plans,” he accuses. 

 

Mycroft glances up from his book, and down at the papers. 

 

“They’re merely trajectories,” he says. “Your speciality.”

 

Jim scowls. Redacted the files may be, but he was certain they were related to weapons plans.

 

“And how are they, professor?”

 

Jim pushes them back, before checking his watch, eyes going wide. 

 

“Accurate enough.”

 

“It either is, or it isn’t. Hypothetical lives at stake here, Professor Moriarty.”

 

He gives Mycroft Holmes a grim look. 

 

“Accurate enough,” he repeats. 

 

The man looks at him, considering. Then he nods and gathers his things.

 

“Thank you for your assistance, professor,” he says. “It’s late, and you haven’t eaten yet. I’ve taken the liberty of ordering something.”

 

Jim startles yet again, but before he can respond, the man is gone. Sure enough, moments later, a delivery comes right to his door, still hot from the oven, from a restaurant he’s seen but never entered. 

 

It happens maybe two, three times again after - Jim absorbed in his work as Mycroft reads and waits in silence, before disappearing. He gleans that what he is doing is, technically, “off the books.” Whoever is in charge of this project seems competent enough, but evidently hasn’t earned the trust of Mycroft Holmes.

 

The next time they see each other, it’s at some endowment gala for the university, taking place in the great hall of some old building in all its gothic splendor. It’s been months since they’ve seen each other, and when Mycroft turns and meets Jim’s eyes, it’s...different.

 

He walks over, the crowd unwittingly making way for him, and guides Jim under an arch. Corners him, practically.

 

From here, no one can see them.

 

“They weren’t so concerned with sightlines in the thirteenth century,” Mycroft murmurs, low, and somehow as if he’d read Jim’s mind.

 

“A chapel,” Jim says, mouth suddenly dry, voice hoarse. “A house of God doesn’t need such things, with what he sees…”

 

Mycroft steps closer and Jim thinks he’s about to kiss him, but he only looks at him softly, with such an amount of feeling Jim hadn’t thought him capable of. 

 

“I wish to know you,” he says, not looking at his face but at his hands, reaching for one before he pulls back. Jim swallows, and Mycroft looks at him now. “Tell me now, if you aren’t interested. Once I start, I’ll do everything in my power to possess you fully.”

 

Jim nods without thought.

 

He’s never felt so off kilter. He wants this pursuit.

 

Mycroft’s thumb brushes across Jim’s bottom lip, and he thinks now,  _ now _ , but Mycroft pulls back again. His smile promises courting unlike anything Jim’s ever experienced. Then he whispers an apology, that he has to leave to entertain this or that foreign dignitary. 

 

Ten, twenty minutes later, Jim is still braced against the wall of that little alcove, head swimming. He leaves early; he’s never been fond of these gatherings anyway.

  
  
  


. . 

  
  
  


Jim is breathy, fingers gripping Mycroft’s shoulder, his hair, as Mycroft works the plug out of him. 

 

“Look at you.”  Mycroft’s voice is honey.

 

“Mm. Thought about you - ah- just taking me up against the wall, under the arch, all those people around with no idea.” He’s practically dripping, and Mycroft is clearly enjoying it, what with the lazy circling of his fingers. Jim throws his head back, exposing the long line of his neck. “I couldn’t wait.”

 

The last bit is as much confession as it is a vow. He peers at Mycroft again, who has been patiently standing by, and now no longer. He enters with a thrust Jim is more than ready to accommodate - Jim groans. It’s absolution. 

 

Mycroft covers Jim’s mouth with his own, though soon they are not so much kisses as hot breath and desperate lips. The desk is immovable, but his articles are not. The frenzy with which the two bodies come together to meet each other, every millimeter, ever millisecond apart too much, send objects tumbling, and Jim, nearly, too. 

 

Jim gasps, working at Mycroft’s shirt, undoing buttons and losing one or two. He wants to touch him everywhere. He  _ needs _ to touch him everywhere. He arches up to meet him, thrashes, as Mycroft works at his cock, the leisurely pace at odds with the sounds he’s making.

 

.

 

Jim rouses, later, feeling a warm weight lifted off him. He stares, mind still in the process of focusing, and Mycroft catches the nearly frightened look on his face.

 

“I just think you’ll be more comfortable in the chair,” he says, crooked half-smile playing on his lips. 

 

Jim acquiesces with a grumble, then reaches for him again.

 

.

 

He blinks awake again, minutes later, his face tucked against Mycroft’s neck. Jim presses a soft, lingering kiss to Mycroft’s jaw, who clears this throat as he’s pulled from sleep as well.

 

“We’ve ruined your clothes,” Mycroft says.

 

Jim grins, and squirms against him.

 

“Worth it, don’t you think?” Mycroft’s smile is openly indulgent. “And I’ve got a coat, anyway.”

 

Mycroft’s hand rubs circles on Jim’s lower back.

 

“I see now that I’ve underestimated you, giving you advance warning like that,” Mycroft says.

 

Jim nods against his shoulder. “Yes, you’d be wise not to do it again.”


	2. Chapter 2

It’s as if they switch temperaments in the privacy of their bedchambers.

 

Mycroft takes Jim like an animal, forcing gasps and shouts from him with his back arched, a hand fisted in his hair, or wrapped around his throat. Jim is held in place, there’s nothing he can do but take it, and he relishes in the sheer surrender of it.

 

Mycroft, who’s not just pressed and proper but nearly laconic in his manner is relentless and controlling, but with none of his usual neat calculation and efficiency. Here, in the high-ceiling home they share, there’s almost a reckless violence to how he holds him, claims him.

 

Jim, known to his colleagues for his temper and bouts of mania is somehow the opposite, slow and sweet, with boundless patience. He dotes on his partner as they make love for ages, dragging it out as long as he can, whispering love and assurances in Mycroft’s ear.

 

They both have secrets they cannot show to the world, parts of themselves they to prefer hide away - for no one but each other.

 

Or so Jim thinks, until Mycroft cancels on not one but two dates, and Jim finds himself sitting alone at their kitchen table one time too many in the same week, meticulously slicing up a tart into little wedges.

 

Truth be told, he’s never thought about Mycroft cheating. He doesn’t know what he would do if he found his lover looking at another. He might just carve his eyes out.

 

Jim sets down the little fruit knife.

 

Best not to jump to fantasy when evidence was simply enough had.

 

.

 

It’s a matter too close to his heart to leave to the likes of private investigators.

 

Jim’s unsure who to go to, at first, nearly opting to watch and follow Mycroft himself. Too risky, he realizes. Mycroft has the uncanny ability to pick him out of any crowd in an instant.

 

He settles for following the work, stealing glimpses into Mycroft’s files and messages and schedules and hoping to divine any discrepancies as he goes along. It’s clear straight away that there are coded items. A meeting here, some procurement there. So Jim follows.

 

And finds himself pinned to a wall by a former blackops military man turned gun for hire.

 

He’s shocked to find that his Mycroft isn’t the straight laced angel he thought him to be, but no matter. Mycroft’s dealings with this Moran character have been strictly business, and Jim finds himself breathing a sigh of relief.

 

“You’re with Holmes, then?” The man, a solid wall of muscle, seems to relax with relief. Talky, Jim thinks, he’ll have to keep an eye on him for Mycroft.

 

“Good,” Moran says. “I’ve been telling that boy he needs backup in the field.”

 

Jim gives him a wry smile, which he returns.

 

“Thinks he can do it all himself, huh,” Moran says.

 

.

 

Jim agrees. Mycroft _does_ need backup in the field. Moran is the only person watching his back, and he’s a freelancer Mycroft’s handpicked himself. His handler is far removed from Mycroft’s actions, and on some level it is understandable.

 

Mycroft has been infiltrating the world of underground crime, weaving together factions without even their own knowledge, creating an intricate web only visible under the right angle, if you knew how to look for it. A once impenetrable world of illegal activity was, under his ministrations, bit by bit becoming a steady funnel of intelligence.

 

Jim’s rather proud of him, really, what with this awfully creative solution. But it has just taken up so _much_ of Mycroft’s _time._

 

“Come back to bed,” Jim grumbles next to Mycroft’s ear, arms draped over his shoulders. “It’s lonely without you.”

 

Mycroft moves, discreetly, to cover some of the more confidential of his papers, though he’s never tried particularly hard to conceal much from Jim, and Jim in return understands the need for confidentiality and isn’t interested in prying anyhow.

 

Jim sees enough to deduce he’s working on pinning down a longstanding terrorist cell’s next target. They’ve gotten bolder in recent months, growing to an international scale.

 

He bites Mycroft’s ear.

 

“They’re targeting a transatlantic flight,” Jim says. “Right before the holiday season. Come on, we can figure out which one it is and what to do with it tomorrow.”

 

Mycroft stills beneath his arms, and Jim worries he’s said the wrong thing. Mycroft turns to him, stricken, and Jim’s brows knit together.

 

“How do you know that?” Mycroft asks. There’s something agonizing in his voice. Jim tightens his grip. He’d rather fight about this now than let it drag on any longer than it needs to be.

 

“I followed you,” he says, voice hard. Then his face falls; this whole thing is silly. “You’ve been so busy with work that I - I - needed to know what you were doing.”

 

Jim doesn’t say much more than that, but it’s enough. Mycroft’s face takes on horror and then comprehension. He mutters something about Moran, about how he should have figured it out earlier, but his arm doesn’t leave Jim’s waist and Jim takes comfort in that.

 

“I can help you,” he adds quietly. It’s _not_ the wrong thing to say, he knows that. But Mycroft looks heartbroken about it anyway.

 

They lean against each other, quiet until Mycroft decides they can talk about it in the morning.

 

.

 

“It’s really not safe,” Mycroft says in the dark.

 

Jim’s wormed his way into the web as well, and it’s all gotten a bit too much to untangle cleanly. Three months have passed; Mycroft tells him they’re closing down the mission.

 

Since Jim’s confession, he’s been keeping his involvement to a bare minimum as well. He hasn’t entirely been out - not with all the plates he has spinning in the air, but he’s been careful to leave no trace of his identity, or in some cases, even his existence. Moran has been helpful in making it seem like there is only one, not two of them.

 

Jim strokes his arm; he understands.

 

“But it’s been useful, hasn’t it? The intelligence,” he asks.

 

Mycroft sighs. “Invaluable.”

 

Jim’s breaths level out over the long stretch of quiet that follows. Mycroft nearly thinks he’s drifted off to sleep, when he adds quietly, contemplatively, “I could do it.”

 

He turns on his side to look at Jim, though he can barely see him in the dark.

 

“No.”

 

“You know I can.” He rubs little circles across Mycroft’s knuckles with his thumb. “Every once in a while something awfully useful pops up out of these tête-à-têtes, and, really, it’s become something of a hobby.”

 

“Don’t make light of this, Jim.”

 

“What, you can consult with hardened criminals, but I can’t?”

 

“You know the only thing that separates me from them is accountability. Please, Jim, you have to understand that. I never meant to drag you into this.”

 

Jim regards him with no small amount of marvel, there in the dark.

 

“You really are something, Mycroft Holmes.”

 

.

 

Mycroft blinks, a brief moment of panic barely registers, but Jim catches it immediately. He’s come out of that soft, cottony place, and there’s just suddenly a bit too _much._ Of everything.

 

“Sorry-” he starts. It’s smothered away by light kisses and stroking of his hair.

 

“No, no,” Jim murmurs, voice taking on a rough edge, gritty with his heavy brogue.  “You’re doing so well,” he whispers. “You’re being so good for me.”

 

Mycroft exhales, slow and quiet. It’s official. He closed out his operation today, and effectively received a promotion. But he doesn’t want to think about that now.

 

“Do you want the ropes?” Jim takes his hand, presses a kiss to the inside of his wrist.

 

Mycroft considers it, then threads his fingers into Jim’s, holds them in place. A no, then. Jim smiles, and squeezes back, anchoring him. Sometimes Mycroft likes to be humiliated, and Jim is more than happy to oblige. Not tonight though, that's not what he wants to indulge in. Jim kisses him once, twice, and Mycroft melts.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and it's gonna STAY pre-series because otherwise what probably happens is Jim being like, well who do you love more me or sherlock??? and mycroft choosing sherlock and Jim going on a bit of a bender before blowing his brains out because of it and I JUST WANT TO LET THEM BE HAPPY FOR A MINUTE OKAY


End file.
